MADISON - Wisconsin voters will decide in November between a long-running secretary of state incumbent and a challenger looking to implement term limits.

Wisconsinites whittled four candidates to two in the August primary. Democrat Doug La Follette of Madison won another chance at the office he has held for three and a half decades. Republican Jay Schroeder of Fox Crossing won the opportunity to challenge La Follette for the position in the Nov. 6 general election.

The office has faced years of downsizing, stripping several of its duties and reducing its full-time staff to just two people.

Both candidates agree the duties should be restored to the secretary of state, but they differ on how the office should function.

Here are the answers to four key questions about the election and why both candidates say Wisconsin voters should care.

What does the secretary of state do?

Wisconsin's secretary of state office is independently run with an elected official at the helm. The secretary is third in line for the governor's office and is mostly responsible for record-keeping duties, primarily providing apostilles, which are international certificates of approval that a document is legitimate.

Over the past several decades, the staff and responsibilities of the office have either been eliminated or shifted to the Department of Financial Institutions or the Department of Administration, both of which are led by governor-appointed secretaries.

The candidates differ on why the office has been downsized. La Follette argues Republican legislators, such as former Gov. Tommy Thompson and Gov. Scott Walker, are to blame for a concerted effort to consolidate power in departments the governor controls.

Schroeder, 56, took aim at La Follette, saying Walker's Democratic predecessor, Jim Doyle, did nothing to revive the secretary's office during his eight years as governor.

"Neither party wanted to help Doug La Follette with duties," Schroeder said. "What does that say?"

One of the secretary's primary duties is to sit on the Board of Commissioners of Public Lands, which is a three-person panel tasked with managing state properties and money to help pay for public school libraries and the University of Wisconsin System. The secretary of state sits on the board with the state treasurer and the attorney general.

What will they do if elected?

If re-elected, La Follette said his first priority would be restoring the duties to the office to make it consistent with other secretary of state offices across the country. This would include allowing the secretary to again handle incorporations, trademarks and commercial code filings. People could do business with the state more efficiently and it would ensure more accountability within the government, he said.

His second priority would be to help elect other Democrats to office, particularly as governor, treasurer and attorney general.

Schroeder said one of his priorities is making sure the office is effective again, so the taxpayers' money is not wasted with the secretary's $70,000 annual salary.

To do so, he laid out several changes he would pursue if elected, including implementing a two-term limit for the office; moving the office out of the state Capitol into "the real state of Wisconsin," such as Stevens Point or Oshkosh; and seeking involvement on the Wisconsin Elections Commission to combat voter fraud and on the Wisconsin Economic Development Corp. to be a conduit between business owners and the state.

In addition, Schroeder thinks it should be a requirement for the secretary to reapply for those positions at the beginning of a new term.

Why should I care about this office?

For La Follette, returning the duties to the secretary of state's office means restoring accountability to government.

"Having an independently elected secretary of state and treasurer is a good thing, and I think the people prefer to have some accountability, so they have more than one person watching over what’s going on," La Follette said.

Schroeder said voters should care because they are funding the position through their tax payments and deserve to get their money's worth. He also said that La Follette should give back the taxpayer funded portion of his pension because the office has had so few duties in recent years.

La Follette called Adamcyzk's report "ridiculous" and said it is "disgusting" that the treasurer would bring it up for discussion.

"How can they criticize that when it’s my money that I contributed every year into the state pension fund," La Follette said. "That’s how pensions work and I don’t think that it’s something that makes a lot of sense for him to criticize."